Name: Southern Brown Bread
Ingredients: 2 cups graham flour; 2 cups cornmeal; ¾ cup molasses; 2 cups sour milk; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1 tablespoon coarse sea salt; washed raisins (optional)

Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Southern Brown Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

In a large bowl, combine graham flour, cornmeal, molasses, sour milk, baking soda, and coarse sea salt.
If desired, add washed raisins to the mixture.

Steam and serve

Pour the batter into a greased pan.
Steam for 2½ hours.
Let it cool for a few minutes before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,577 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + raisintop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,155 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).
Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,429 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Graham flour: Provides the bulk and the coarse, wholesome structure of the loaf.
Cornmeal: Adds body and a grainy, crumbly texture to the bread.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, dark color and moisture.
Sour milk: Supplies liquid and acidity that reacts with the baking soda.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that lifts the batter.

The step that matters

Steam for the full time. Steaming gently sets the batter into a moist, dense loaf. Cutting the time short leaves the center under-set and gummy, while the steam keeps the crust from drying out.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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Southern Brown Bread